


Underneath

by Claire



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-01-31
Updated: 2004-01-31
Packaged: 2018-10-19 00:05:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10628019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Claire/pseuds/Claire
Summary: In which Oz asks for Giles' help





	

Rupert Giles can't stop the frown that springs to his face when he hears the knock at his door. The books that are scattered around the room have been calling at him for weeks, and he'd hoped with Buffy out of town with her father, that he'd finally have some time to deal with them. Quickly finishing off the sentence he's writing before he moves, Giles opens the front door, looking at the young man standing on his doorstep.

"I need your help."

Motioning for him to come inside, Giles turns and walks back into his lounge, the sound of the door clicking shut behind him the only thing telling him that Oz has followed.

"How can I help you?" The question is asked as the pile of books Giles has been researching is moved aside, and a place is cleared for Oz to sit.

The young man leans the guitar case he's carrying against the sofa. "Devon wants us to start playing 'the classics'." Giles raises an eyebrow at the near perfect imitation of the Dingoes' lead singer. "He's fixated." The barely stopped roll of Oz's eyes is almost audible. Oz leans down and opens the guitar case, pulling out several sheets of paper and holding them out. "I can't get the chords right. They sound off."

Giles takes the music, scanning it briefly. "And you thought I'd be able to help." Because although he's made no secret of the fact that he plays, he's hardly advertised it either, not since-

"I heard you play it in the coffee shop."

Ah, that explains the leap Oz has made from Watcher to musical virtuoso. He's only ever played once in public in Sunnydale. The singer that the coffee bar had hired hadn't turned up one night. (At least, not until a week later and wearing the latest in vampire couture.) So Giles had ended up stepping in. It had been his one and only public appearance. The very next day Snyder had called him into the office and commented that it hardly looked professional for the school librarian to be busking. And so had ended the Sunnydale musical career of Rupert Giles. He's always assumed none of the students saw him, never heard any whispered commentaries in the corridors, but even a Watcher can miss things.

"You were note perfect."

There's no exaggeration in Oz's tone, no hint of the thought of a lie. And the first reaction of telling Oz that he's just too busy dies before it even rises in his throat. Because suddenly the books and the prophecies don't seem that important, and he wants something that has nothing to do with Latin, Enochian or the 1,000 yearly virgin sacrifice of the Ashrack Clan.

"How are you with it so far?"

Oz flashes him a grateful smile before taking his guitar out of the still open case and starting to play.

Giles closes his eyes, listening. The tune is there, but the sound is almost harsh, like Oz's fingers are trying to find a melody they're not quite sure of yet.

"You see what I mean?" Oz looks at him, fingertips still absently caressing guitar strings.

Without thinking about it, he walks over to the couch, asking Oz to move slightly and ignoring the questioning look when he moves to sit directly behind the younger man. Settling behind Oz, he puts his arms around the redhead and tries to ignore the warmth seeping through the layers of clothing that separate them. "Put your fingers over mine." He waits until he can feel Oz's hands on his before he starts to play the song through slowly, moving their joined fingers to each chord in turn.

They run through the song in slow motion, each time increasing their pace. And then he slips his hands out from under Oz's, leaving only one set of fingers to play the melody. As the last note dies in the air Oz turns his head.

"Thank you." The words are soft, quietly spoken to reach the man sitting so closely behind him it's tipping over the border of impropriety.

And Giles wants to move but can't, pinned by green eyes with more weight in them than a boy of Oz's age should know. Finds himself leaning in when Oz moves closer, lips brushing across lips, delivering the faintest hint of menthol and raspberries, and he barely has the presence of mind to pull away, instead of chasing for another taste.

Oz looks at him, question dripping from every pore.

"I want you."

He smiles at the thought of youth in its every simplicity, need and desire not yet beaten away by a world of thought and rationalisation. Because there's no way he can see Oz understanding what this means, how it will change things, how different they are.

"I'm old." And they aren't the words he was expecting to say, but they're the truth. Too many years have gone by for him to do anything but admit it.

"And I'm a werewolf, so now we have the pleasantries out of the way."

Then Oz's lips are back on his, heavy and insistent. Hands move to his shirt, opening buttons and slipping inside, fingers gliding over skin, mapping every nuance. There's a part of his mind telling him there are a hundred reasons why this is wrong, but Oz reminds him too much of a boy he used to know, and it's too much to deny it for a second time.

Lips open and accept, and every touch Oz has given him is paid back twice over. The fingers exploring his body stop their quest, tracing a line over his skin. Pulling back slightly Oz pushes back Giles' shirt, exposing warm skin to the air. And Giles know what Oz's fingers have found, what Oz's eyes are drawn to. Fingers reach out, carefully tracing the scar that lies over his side.

"How?"

"My adolescence wasn't all tweed and books." Words accompanied by flashes of image, of Randall screaming, of Ethan laughing, of skin slapping against skin in the most sordid of ways. And then the images are gone in a sweep of tongue along marred skin.

"I want you." Oz's voice is soft, almost inaudible, but the words still carry.

He knows he should stop this now before it gets too far, before anything that can't be denied in the morning can occur. Knows that there's no way Oz can seriously want him, not when-

"Stop thinking." Oz's finger covers his lips, cutting off his thoughts as though they were words. "I. Want. You."

Thoughts of rejection dissolve in the reflection of heavy-lidded green eyes, and clarity comes to him in a single word.

"Yes."

And as the younger man leads him towards the bedroom, Rupert Giles realises that maybe Oz understands after all.


End file.
